Hi, this is Jay P. Today on The Slanted Lens we’re going to look at lens choice, camera settings and lighting to light a senior portrait outside. We’ll look at how to do several multiple setups quickly when you’re working with your senior. Then we’re going to look at how to light our senior and how to pose them. So we better get started and see what we can do. We’re going to start with volleyball and make it happen.
Special thanks to Saal Digital for sponsoring this video. Thanks Saal! Absolutely!
So lens choice is going to be a 70-200 or on the Tamron a 70-180 f/2.8. The reason I choose that lens is because it allows me to get back away from my subject matter and it lets the background fall way out of focus. It’s just a really good way to work because I can do full body and the background falls out of focus because I can get back on that 200 millimeters. I can come forward into almost a 100 millimeter and that gives me a beautiful portrait type lens at a 100 millimeters. So it gives me everything from a good portrait, 85mm into a long lens that lets the background fall out of focus. It’s going to fall out of focus at that 85mm into the 200mm and just isolates the subject from the background. It makes a beautiful scene. So 70-180mm or 70-200mm f/2.8. That’s my lens!
So let’s talk about camera settings. I want f/2.8. I want a shallow depth of field. But I’m shooting a 180 millimeter lens which means I’ve got to have a fast enough shutter that I can hand hold it. So I’m going to go f/2.8. I’m going to put my shutter at 1/60th of a second on manual. And now I’m going to bring my strobes in and match my strobes to those settings. I don’t have to have a lot of power for my strobe. Now what I might do, because I’ve got three stops of ND on here in order to get the ambient light down to 1/60 at f/2.8, because if I take this three stops of ND I’ve got to be way past where I can sync. And then I’d go to high speed sync. High speed sync for me is just, you don’t have enough power to be able to make it work, as well as I like. A nice three stops of ND, it brings that ambient light down to 1/60. Now at f/2.8 I can just shoot all day with those strobes. And my ISO, I’ll try to keep my ISO between 100 ISO and 200 ISO. I may push that up a little bit in order to accommodate the exposure if it gets a little dark. I’ll push that ISO up a tiny bit. I’ll be balancing these out quite a bit. I may have to go a little faster with the shutter or a little slower the shutter. And I may have to take the ISO and go somewhere between 160 ISO and 200 ISO. But those are my camera settings, ISO 100 to 200, f/2.8 and somewhere around 1/60th of a second.
So for focus I’m going to use the wide area focus on the Sony. And I’m going to use the eye detect. It’s going to really help me catch her eyes even with the glasses on. We’re seeing it. I can see the box. It focuses in on the eye. When I blow it up I see those sharp eyelashes through the glasses. So it really works well. It’s going to make it easy for me to shoot when she’s in different places on the sensor. I can just keep shooting away and that way the number of focus points on the Sony and that eye detect really works out well. That’s my focus setting.
So from the images we take today we’re going to provide a book for Sydney. This is one of the high-end premium books from Saal Digital. So you don’t mind if we put my picture on the cover do you? No, I’ll always remember you for it. That’s right! Who wants to see that guy all the time. So what’s really amazing about these books is that they have a flat binding which allows you to do images across the gutter. Every image is going to cross the gutter. It lays flat on the table. It’s easy to look at. It’s really nice. Also, the color is color fast up to 75 years, longer than 75. It’s guaranteed for 75 years. And last of all you either get a matte surface or a glossy surface. So what do you want, matte or glossy? I like the look of glossy. I think glossy is awesome. So glossy it is. So there it is, a premium book from Saal Digital.
A couple of tips on shooting multiple setups in a row. First off, she came with her hair up and ready for the Ballet Folklorico. That way she had the dress and her hair, everything was ready for that. We can shoot immediately when she arrives. Now we can go to volleyball. Her hair is still up. Just take the things out of her hair and go right to the volleyball. We have the volleyball nets on the c-stands so we can slide them into place. We can shoot immediately. We had that more over in the shade so it had a little darker look, had a little different look. And now we’re going to move back out here out of the shade. We’re going to shoot just a lot of stuff with the natural light. We have such beautiful light today.My settings have really held at 1/60th of a second at f/2.8. And that strobe light is just opening up the shadows just a little bit. So last setup we’re going to go to just a nice outfit. She can drop her hair now. It’s easy to comb the hair out to be able to move to this last setup. If you go the other way around you’re never going to make the time because it’s going to take an hour getting the hair right. So start with the hair up. Go to the volleyball and hair down and we can finish up. So the bottom line is just having the props and things ready so you can just move into the next setup. While she’s changing we can quickly set up. Then we can shoot away. You want to try to do, in about two and a half hours, you want to do three to five setups with a person. So you have a lot of different options. And that gives you enough to choose from. They’re going to have a nice variety. It makes a great book. It gives you all the images that you need. So it’s just a matter of having those props ready and move from one to the next and off you go.
So when I’m shooting I’m really looking to put her in the brightest spot of the background. So there’s a little bit of arch in the trees and I see sky back there. So in the first shot I have her over on the left and she’s in the dark area and that white distraction is to the right. If I move a little bit to my left I get her right in that bright area in the background. Now it gives us a nice frame around her. It gives us, it really emphasizes her in the shot and makes a big difference. So pay attention to that background. The background is going to make or break your image. So look for bright spots or look for spots that have great bokeh. But just pay attention to that background.
So the lighting is very simple for this setup. I’ve got an octo-box with an FJ400. That FJ400 and the octo-box, I’m going to make them about seven or eight feet away from Sydney. And I’m just going to keep them about that distance wherever we go. When we shot the volleyball, when we shot the fence out front, when we did the folklorico it’s just always about the same distance. It’s going to be seven feet because it gives me f/2.8. So it makes it easy for me to follow her and to set the light up. I’ve been setting it slightly behind her in each one of these setups so that it gives me the shadow side to shoot into the shadow side of the face. It’s a very simple setup. It makes it so I can go to different setups really quickly. I’m not trying to re-light. I know I may have to lower it if she goes down the ground. We have to raise it. But that’s about all I’m going to do to it and keep it about seven feet away from her. So that’s the lighting, very simple.
So I learned a few things today. One is, I take too long on each setup. Julene’s going, move on move on. I need to do more setups so I can get five, six, eight or ten different setups. And I think I need to shoot less at each one so I can get more variety. I think that would help. I do love that 70-180mm or 70-200mm. It’s a beautiful lens. It gives you beautiful out of focus backgrounds. And just get high, get low and change things up so you get a lot of variety. And those camera settings stayed pretty much the same between 1/125th of a second and 1/250th of a second at f/2.8. My strobe is always about seven feet away from Sydney. And with all that together we can shoot fast and it worked out really well. So this was a lot of fun. Did you enjoy it? Yes, I did. There you go. If you want to see other lessons like this check these out. So keep those cameras rollin’ and keep on clickin’!
